Online courses directory (148)

This course will introduce the concept of environmental ethics, a philosophy that extends the ethical concepts traditionally applied to human behavior to address the entire natural world. The course will outline the history of environmental ethics, discuss the idea of environmental justice, and explore how our views about the natural world have changed over time. Though environmental ethics is considered a fairly new branch of scientific philosophy, it has actually been debated avidly since the 19th century. From the frontier era of the developing United States through to the modern-day environmental movement, you will identify and analyze the key pioneers and events in the move to help preserve our planet for future generations and species. You will also explore the notion of environmental justice and how this impacts certain social groups, particularly in poorer communities throughout the world. Finally, you will familiarize yourself with the major environmental laws and world views that support the envir…

Become aware of the conscious and unconscious codes of meaning we send when communicating with others.

This course will introduce you to United States history from the end of the Civil War in 1865 through the first decade of the twenty-first century. You will learn about the major political, economic, and social changes that took place in America during this nearly 150-year period. The course will be structured chronologically, with each unit focusing on a significant historical subject. The units will include representative primary-source documents that illustrate important overarching political, economic, and social themes, such as the growth and expansion of political representation and civil rights in America, industrial development and economic change, race and ethnicity in American society, and cultural change over time. These primary documents offer you insights into the thinking of people who directly witnessed and experienced these historical developments. By the end of the course, you will understand how the United States grew from a relatively weak and divided agricultural nation into a cohesive mil…

Scott McLean, formerly the Shadle-Edgecombe Endowed Faculty Chair at Arizona Western College, introduces the textbook used throughout this course by noting that “[E]ffective communication takes preparation, practice, and persistence.  There are many ways to learn communication skills; the school of experience, or ‘hard knocks,’ is one of them.  But in the business environment, a ‘knock’ (or lesson learned) may come at the expense of your credibility through a blown presentation to a client.” Effective communication skills are a prerequisite for succeeding in business.  Communication tools and activities connect people within and beyond the organization in order to establish the business’s place in the corporate community and the social community, and as a result, that communication needs to be consistent, effective, and customized for the business to prosper.  McLean’s textbook provides theories and practical information that represent the heart of this course, while additional resources a…

This course will introduce you to the history of the Atlantic slave trade from 1500 to 1900. You will learn about the slave trade, its causes, and its effects on Africa, Europe, and the Americas. The course will be structured chronologically and geographically; each unit with focus on a particular aspect of the Atlantic slave trade. Each unit will include representative primary-source documents that illustrate important overarching political, economic, and social themes, such as slavery and the slave trade within African societies, the growth of plantation societies in the New World, the advent of European slave dealing in western Africa, the simultaneous growth of European empires and the Atlantic slave trade, the nature of slave trading and the Middle Passage, and the abolition of the Atlantic slave trade in the nineteenth century. By the end of the course, you will understand how the Atlantic slave trade began as a fledgling enterprise of the English, Portuguese, and Spanish in the 1500s and why, by the mi…

In this course, we will study the history of Western art, beginning with the first objects created by prehistoric humans around 20,000 years ago and ending with the art and architecture of the High Gothic period in fourteenth-century Europe.  The information presented in this course will provide you with the tools to recognize important works of art and historical styles, as well as to understand the historical context and cultural developments of Western art history through the end of the medieval period.  Introductory readings paired with detailed lectures will provide you with a well-rounded sense of the history, art, and culture of the West up through the medieval period. At the end of this course, you will be able to identify key works of art and artistic periods in Western history.  You will also be able to discuss the development of stylistic movements and relate those developments to important historical events.  Completion of this course will prepare you for ARTH111, which surveys the history o…

Ce cours propose de dresser en premier lieu un état de la planète en termes de répartition de la richesse sur terre et de problèmes environnementaux globaux. A partir de là d'envisager les scénarios possibles et d'approfondir la notion de durabilité.

PURPOSE OF COURSE…

This open course uses the sesquicentennial of President Lincoln's issuance of the emancipation proclamation in 1863, to explore what happened in the United States before emancipation, how emancipation worked once...

Build your earth science vocabulary and learn about cycles of matter and types of sedimentary rocks through the Education Portal course Earth Science 101: Earth Science. Our series of video lessons and accompanying self-assessment quizzes can help you boost your scientific knowledge ahead of the Excelsior Earth Science exam . This course was designed by experienced educators and examines both science basics, like experimental design and systems of measurement, and more advanced topics, such as analysis of rock deformation and theories of continental drift.

Educational psychology is concerned with how students learn and develop. It emphasizes trends in educational development while also focusing on educational diversity. For teachers and trainers to fulfil their instructional role most effectively, their teaching methods must be grounded in educational psychology. Educational psychology provides a framework for teachers and trainers to plan, create and deliver effective lessons, and assess each student's learning. <br /><br />In this free online course, you will explore the topic of educational psychology in detail. Key development theories related to the learning process are examined and practical classroom examples are supplied to engage the you throughout the course. Vital material about student diversity is also presented, including strategies and information about working with students with special educational needs. <br /><br />This free online course will be of great interest to professionals in the education sector who would like a greater knowledge and understanding of educational psychology.<br />

This course is ideal for students who would like to build their foundational knowledge of the field of psychology. It also provides an introduction for anyone who is interested in the enduring understanding of the field of psychology such as:
-Psychology is the scientific study of behavior and mental processes.
-Intuition and introspection are helpful to understanding psychology, but often fail us.
-The evolution of Psychology as a discipline is one which moves from intuition and introspection towards a more scientific approach.
-Different schools of Psychology investigate different aspects of the effects of environment and biology on behavior; there is no one "right" approach.
Learning objectives for this course are: 1. To identify theoretical underpinnings of the major areas of psychology, including cognition (thought, memory, perception), learning, personality, social and environmental influences, development, and physiology of behavior. 2. To explain different models of human behavior based on science versus intuition or general ways of knowing. 3. To recognize ways of pursuing questions in Psychology via discussion of theory and empirical research 4. To describe connections between knowledge gained in Psychology to everyday life.

Build your earth science vocabulary and learn about cycles of matter and types of sedimentary rocks through the Education Portal course Earth Science 101: Earth Science. Our series of video lessons and accompanying self-assessment quizzes can help you boost your scientific knowledge ahead of the Excelsior Earth Science exam . This course was designed by experienced educators and examines both science basics, like experimental design and systems of measurement, and more advanced topics, such as analysis of rock deformation and theories of continental drift.

This course will introduce you to cognitive psychology, or the study of the ways in which we come to know about the world around us and about one another.  While you may understand “cognition” as “thinking” or “thoughts,” we will here use the term to refer to almost any process that takes place within the human mind. Though cognitive psychology as a formal branch of study has only been around since the late 1960s, it has been studied for decades as an area of interest in psychological inquiry and has its roots in philosophy.  In the late 1880s, for example, Ebbinghaus conducted some of the very first scientifically based studies of cognition when he attempted to explain the mechanism of memory.  Memory, along with attention, perception, language, and decision making, are amongst the most prominent issues within the broad and diverse field of cognitive psychology.  While we could spend an entire semester exploring just one of these issues, this course will instead provide you with an overview…

John Green teaches you the history of the world in 42 episodes of Crash Course. The Agricultural Revolution. Indus Valley Civilization. Ancient Mesopotamia. Ancient Egypt. Greeks and Persians. Buddha and Ashoka. 2000 Years of Chinese History! The Mandate of Heaven and Confuscius. Alexander the Great and the Situation... the Great?. The Silk Road and Ancient Trade. The Roman Empire. Or Republic. Or... Which Was It?. Christianity from Judaism to Constantine. Fall of Rome the Roman Empire... in the 15th Century. Islam, the Quran, and the Five Pillars All Without a Flamewar. The Dark Ages...How Dark Were They, Really?. The Crusades - Pilgrimage or Holy War?. Mansa Musa and Islam in Africa. Wait for it... The Mongols!. International Commerce, Snorkeling Camels, and The Indian Ocean Trade. Venice and the Ottoman Empire. Russia, the Kievan Rus, and the Mongols. Columbus, de Gama, and Zheng He! 15th Century Mariners. The Renaissance: Was it a Thing?. The Columbian Exchange. The Atlantic Slave Trade. The Spanish Empire, Silver, & Runaway Inflation. The Seven Years War. The Amazing Life and Strange Death of Captain Cook. Tea, Taxes, and The American Revolution. The French Revolution. The Haitian Revolutions. Latin American Revolutions. Coal, Steam, and The Industrial Revolution. Capitalism and Socialism. Samurai, Daimyo, Matthew Perry, and Nationalism. Imperialism. Archdukes, Cynicism, and World War I. Communists, Nationalists, and China's Revolutions. World War II. USA vs USSR Fight! The Cold War. Decolonization and Nationalism Triumphant. Globalization I - The Upside. Globalization II - Good or Bad?. The Agricultural Revolution. Indus Valley Civilization. Ancient Mesopotamia. Ancient Egypt. Greeks and Persians. Buddha and Ashoka. 2000 Years of Chinese History! The Mandate of Heaven and Confuscius. Alexander the Great and the Situation... the Great?. The Silk Road and Ancient Trade. The Roman Empire. Or Republic. Or... Which Was It?. Christianity from Judaism to Constantine. Fall of Rome the Roman Empire... in the 15th Century. Islam, the Quran, and the Five Pillars All Without a Flamewar. The Dark Ages...How Dark Were They, Really?. The Crusades - Pilgrimage or Holy War?. Mansa Musa and Islam in Africa. Wait for it... The Mongols!. International Commerce, Snorkeling Camels, and The Indian Ocean Trade. Venice and the Ottoman Empire. Russia, the Kievan Rus, and the Mongols. Columbus, de Gama, and Zheng He! 15th Century Mariners. The Renaissance: Was it a Thing?. The Columbian Exchange. The Atlantic Slave Trade. The Spanish Empire, Silver, & Runaway Inflation. The Seven Years War. The Amazing Life and Strange Death of Captain Cook. Tea, Taxes, and The American Revolution. The French Revolution. The Haitian Revolutions. Latin American Revolutions. Coal, Steam, and The Industrial Revolution. Capitalism and Socialism. Samurai, Daimyo, Matthew Perry, and Nationalism. Imperialism. Archdukes, Cynicism, and World War I. Communists, Nationalists, and China's Revolutions. World War II. USA vs USSR Fight! The Cold War. Decolonization and Nationalism Triumphant. Globalization I - The Upside. Globalization II - Good or Bad?.

This free five-module online introductory course gives you the essential concepts, techniques, and skills to effectively work with data and produce compelling data stories under tight deadlines. Comprised of video lectures, tutorials, assignments, readings, and discussion forums, this course is open to anyone in the world with an Internet connection who wants to tell stories with data. Our media environment is increasingly saturated with data, including large collections of leaked documents published by Wikileaks, public databases about lobbying or government spending, and “big data” from social networks such as Twitter and Facebook. As a result, many media organisations seek data-savvy journalists to help them process this information to understand what is in it, to identify what is important, and to provide insights to readers in a compelling way. Modules: 1. Data journalism in the newsroom, with instructor Simon Rogers 2. Finding data to support stories, with instructor Paul Bradshaw 3. Finding story ideas with data analysis, with instructor Steve Doig 4. Dealing with messy data, with instructor Nicolas Kayser-Bril 5. Telling stories with visualization, with instructor Alberto Cairo Meet the instructors: Recommended reading: The Data Journalism Handbook Sponsors: Google; Ministry of Education, Culture and Science of the Netherlands; African Media Initiative; The World Bank Advisory board: Justin Arenstein (African Media Initiative); Josh Hatch (The Chronicle of Higher Education); Scott Klein (ProPublica); Angélica Peralta Ramos (La Nacion, Argentina); Aron Pilhofer (The New York Times); Guido Romeo (Wired Italy); Sascha Venohr (Zeit Online) Organisers: The European Journalism Centre is a non-profit international foundation with the remit to improve, strengthen, and underpin journalism and the news media in the interest of a functioning democratic public sphere. This mission has two main aspects: safeguarding, enhancing, and future-proofing quality journalism in Europe and the world and media freedom in emerging and developing countries. Data Driven Journalism is one of the leading initiatives for training, resources and networking in the area of data journalism. Founded in 2010, the programme is dedicated to accelerating the diffusion and improving the quality of data journalism around the world. We run the website DataDrivenJournalism.net as well as the School of Data Journalism, and produced the Data Journalism Handbook. For more information about this course, please visit the course website.

Do you know what you’re watching? What you’re reading? You might think that what comes across your television or web browser, in your newspaper or magazine, or on your movie screen is pretty much the whole message; what you see is what you get. But the content we see, read, and hear is the product of complex forces − economic, governmental, historical, and technological. This course will explore those underlying forces and provide analytical tools to evaluate media critically. An overall goal is to become media literate, to gain an understanding of mass media as cultural industries that seek to influence our behavior and affect our values as a society. Unit 1 aims to define mass communication, mass media, and culture. It also will introduce the core concepts of media literacy and the concept of transmedia, the practice of integrating entertainment experiences across a range of different media platforms. Unit 2 will introduce selected theories that will help in analyzing mass communication and its effect…

Abnormal psychology is one of the most recognizable and intriguing subfields of study in psychology. Part of what makes this field so intriguing is that it challenges us to define what is normal and abnormal. Most experts in the field have settled on several criteria to define abnormal behavior; however, this definition and even the very existence of certain disorders still remain a source of debate. This course will help us to define abnormal and normal behaviors and to group these abnormal phenomena into disorders. These disorders are used to capture a particular type of abnormal psychological phenomena and to help us diagnose or make an educated decision regarding what disorder a patient/client may have. In order to distinguish between different disorders, clinicians often use the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, which identifies the specific criteria used when diagnosing patients/clients. This manual represents the industry standard for psychologists and psychiatrists, who often…

Build your earth science vocabulary and learn about cycles of matter and types of sedimentary rocks through the Education Portal course Earth Science 101: Earth Science. Our series of video lessons and accompanying self-assessment quizzes can help you boost your scientific knowledge ahead of the Excelsior Earth Science exam . This course was designed by experienced educators and examines both science basics, like experimental design and systems of measurement, and more advanced topics, such as analysis of rock deformation and theories of continental drift.